


The Ransom of Adam Young

by atamascolily



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Gen, Humor, Kidnapping, O. Henry, POV Crowley (Good Omens), POV First Person, Parody, a complete and total ripoff of The Ransom of Red Chief
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-07
Updated: 2019-10-07
Packaged: 2020-11-26 13:57:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,361
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20931359
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/atamascolily/pseuds/atamascolily
Summary: Crowley and Aziraphale decide to prevent the Apocalypse by kidnapping the Antichrist. Fortunately (or not?), the Antichrist thinks this new game is a swell one.





	The Ransom of Adam Young

**Author's Note:**

  * For [burningbright](https://archiveofourown.org/users/burningbright/gifts).

> For burningbright, who wanted a kidnapping fic. 
> 
> Literally everything in this fic is either stolen from or a parody of the 1907 public domain short story ["The Ransom of Red Chief"](http://www.online-literature.com/donne/1041/) by O. Henry. (Yes, even the "Snake-Eye" bit!) I've also included a few lines verbatim from the _Good Omens_ novel by Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett for additional ambience.

It looked like a sure thing: but wait till I tell you. We were down south, in Oxfordshire - Aziraphale and myself -- in search of the Antichrist when this kidnapping idea struck us. It was, as the angel afterwards expressed it, "during a moment of temporary mental apparition"; but he didn't mention that till later. Being a demon myself, I was fine with it, of course. 

There was a town down there called Lower Tadfield, and it was bloody beautiful. Classic little English town, like out of some nineteenth century boys' adventure novel. If Turner and Landseer had met Samuel Palmer in a pub and worked it all out, and then got Stubbs to do the horses, it couldn’t have been better. The inhabitants weren't much to look at, smug and self-satisfied as humans always are, but there was nothing to complain about, geographically speaking. 

Aziraphale and me had an Agreement spanning six thousand years, and we needed the world to continue existing in order to keep on with it. We talked it over on the way down from London, and agreed that this whole Apocalypse business had to be stopped. Can't have Armageddeon without the Antichrist, we reasoned; therefore a kidnapping project ought to do the job nicely, especially since both Heaven and Hell had lost track of the Antichrist eleven years earlier and no one knew it but us. The angelic and demonic hosts couldn't get after us with anything stronger than miracles and maybe some hellhounds and a strongly worded note in our annual performance reviews--as long as they never found out it was us who done it. So, it looked promising.

Our victim was the spawn of Satan and in theory the only child of a prominent citizen named Young. The father was respectable and upright sort of man, the kind who smoked a pipe on the porch to avoid upsetting his wife, with a fondness for cardigans with the kind of zigzag pattern that went out of style in 1938. The kid was a boy of eleven, with a classical face that didn’t belong in the twentieth century, thatched with golden curls which glowed. Aziraphale and me figured that with the Antichrist out of the picture, the end of the world would screech to a halt. But wait till I tell you what happened. 

About two miles from Lower Tadfield was a little mountain, covered with a dense cedar brake--or at least there was after me and Aziraphale got through with it. On the rear elevation of this mountain was a cave. There we stored provisions, according to Aziraphale's exacting standards; he's very particular about his meals and likes to make sure everything's done right. The Friday afternoon before the end of the world, we drove in the Bentley past old Young's house. The kid was in the street, throwing rocks at a wasp's nest on the opposite fence.

"Hey, little boy!" says Aziraphale, big smile plastered cross his face, "would you like to have a bag of candy and a nice ride?"

The boy catches him neatly in the eye with a stone.

"Modern youth, no manners whatsoever," mutters Aziraphale, not deterred in the slightest from the path of righteousness interference. Which meant it was my turn now. 

"Oi, you there," says I, and I didn't brook no nonsense. "Get in the car right now, and no one else gets hurt." 

"You're not going to hurt me," says the Antichrist, just as calm as you please. 

"'Course not," says I. I didn't spend eleven years as a nanny for nothing. "You've already hurt my companion here; no need to do any more damage. Just get in the car, and let's be quick about it." 

He thought it over for a moment, then a smile lit up his face like a nebula (and I've seen plenty of 'em in my time). "I've always wanted to be kidnapped. Let's go, right away. I assume you already have a cave lined up and waiting? It wouldn't be a proper kidnapping without a cave to hide out in." 

I thought to myself, this kid's a sharp one, but I didn't show none of that on my face. "That's right, now get in, or else we'll charge your father an extra five hundred pounds when we write him for ransom." I didn't mention _which_ father, of course. 

And he got all into it, pretending to holler and scream, and insisting we tie his hands behind his back and put a blindfold over his eyes, just like they do in the movies. At last, we got him in the back of the Bentley and drove away. We took him up to the cave and then I parked the Bentley somewhere where it wouldn't be found, then went back up to the mountain. 

Aziraphale was too stubborn to work miracles on himself, so he was pasting court-plaster over the bruise on his features--or at least he was till I healed him. There was a fire burning behind the big rock at the entrance of the cave, and the boy was watching a pot of boiling coffee, with his blindfold off but both hands still tied behind his back. He looks over at me when I come up and says "This is a great game. All my friends are going to be jealous. _They've_ never been kidnapped." 

Whatever we was expecting from the Antichrist, this wasn't it. The fun of camping out in a cave made him forget that he was a captive himself much of the time. He immediately christened me Snake-eye, the Spy--without having seen me without my sunglasses, mind you--and announced that, when his friends used his dog (that would be the hellhound, I thought) to track us down and staged a rescue, I was to be broiled at the stake at the rising of the sun afterwards.

To be honest, if the Powers Below found out what we was up to, there would be broiling one way or another, but I did my best to pay him no mind. He could cause things to happen just by wishin' for 'em, but he didn't know that yet, and I wasn't going to be the one to tell him. Nor was Aziraphale, if I had anything to say about it. 

Then we had supper; and he filled his mouth full of bacon and biscuits, and began to talk. He made a during-dinner speech something like this:

"I like this fine. My parents never let me go camping, but I've read all about it in books and they always say you have to have bacon and biscuits for it to be a proper camp-out. I hate to go to school; it's so boring and none of the teachers ever answer my questions. Mice ate up six of Brian's sister's socks last winter. Are there any other kidnappers lurking in these woods? I want some more biscuits. Did you know a witch moved into Jasmine Cottage the other day? She gave me some magazines. You should see my dog; his name is Dog and he's the best dog ever. What makes your hair so red, Snake-eye? My father has lots of money, probably 'cause he doesn't believe in ever spending it. Are the stars hot? My friends and I whipped Greasy Johnson and his gang twice, Saturday, and they got us back real good both times. I don't like girls, except for Pepper, who doesn't really count because she kicks so hard. The pond is the best place to catch frogs with your bare hands. Why are apples round and what's the point of growing 'em if people get mad at your for eatin' 'em? Have you got beds to sleep on in this cave? Wensleydale has got six toes. Have you ever seen the Tibetans that are burrowing underground and spying on us? What about Atlantis?"

"I do hope his parents don't panic when they find him missing," Aziraphale says to me all quiet-like, born worrier that he is. I scoffed at that. 

"You there," says I to the kid by way of example, "would you like to go home?"

"Aw, what for?" says he. "I don't have any fun at home. I already told you I hate to go to school. I like this kidnapping game mighty fine. You won't take me back home again, Snake-eye, will you?"

"Not right away," says I. "We'll stay here in the cave a while."

"All right!" says he. "That'll be fine. I never had such fun in all my life."

We went to bed about eleven o'clock. We spread down some wide blankets and quilts and put the Antichrist between us. We weren't afraid he'd run away. He kept us awake for three hours, jumping up and screeching: "Hey, did you hear that?" in mine and Aziraphale's ears, as the fancied crackle of a twig or the rustle of a leaf revealed to his young imagination the stealthy approach of the police or maybe his gang coming to rescue him. At last, I fell into a troubled sleep, and dreamed that I had been kidnapped and chained to a tree by a ferocious pirate with a mop of perfect blond curls.

Just at daybreak, I was awakened by a series of awful screams from Aziraphale. They weren't yells, or howls, or shouts, or whoops, or yalps, such as you'd expect from an angelic set of vocal organs -- they were simply indecent, terrifying, humiliating screams, such as humans emit when they see ghosts or caterpillars. It's an awful thing to hear a desperate principality scream incontinently in a cave at daybreak. I hadn't heard such a thing since we was back in the Garden together, right after the old softie gave away his flaming sword. You didn't need to scream like that so long as you had a flaming sword. 

I jumped up to see what the matter was. There was a black and white spotted mutt jumping up on Aziraphale's chest--one of those little dogs that can go down rabbit-holes, with one ear permanently inside out. It was the Hellhound of the Antichrist, slobbering all over the struggling angel in an attempt to lick him in the face. 

"I don't understand why you're so upset," the Antichrist says, once I finally got the dog off Aziraphale. "It's just how Dog says hello, after all." 

I looked over and I saw he was standing up with both his hands free and a knife. I took the knife away from him, which he was a good sport about, though he kept protesting, "It isn't a real kidnapping if I don't try to escape at least once, you know," I ignored him, till went over to pet the Hellhound, who was so excited to be reunited with its master it slobbered all over the blankets. 

I made the kid lie down again, the Hellhound curled up at his feet. But, from that moment, Aziraphale was even more of a nervous wreck than usual. He laid down on his side of the bed away from the dog-slobber, but he never closed an eye again in sleep as long as that boy was with us. (Good thing neither of us need sleep, is what I say.) I dozed off for a while, but along toward sun-up I remembered that that boy had said I was to be burned at the stake at the rising of the sun when the rest of his gang arrived. I wasn't nervous or afraid; but I sat up and lit a cigarette and leaned against a rock.

What you getting up so soon for, Crowley?" asked Aziraphale.

"Me?" says I. "Oh, just keeping watch in case one of the heavenly host stumbles over us."

"You're a liar!" says Aziraphale. "You're afraid. He said you were to be burned at sunrise, and you're afraid he'd make it happen." 

"Sure," said I. "But anybody who wants to burn me had better do it _after_ the world ends and not a moment before. Now, you and the Beast get up and cook breakfast, while I go up on the top of this mountain and reconnoiter."

I went up on the peak of the little mountain and ran my eye over the contiguous vicinity. Over toward Lower Tadfield I half-expected to see the legions of hell beating down towards us. But instead I saw a peaceful landscape, ordinary as you please, with one older gent walking his miniature poodle, and that was that. There was a sylvan attitude of somnolent sleepiness pervading that section of the external outward surface of Oxfordshire that lay exposed to my view. "Perhaps," says I to myself, "it has not yet been discovered that the Antichrist has gone missing. Hope my infernal superiors never find out I was involved!" says I, and I went down the mountain to breakfast. This much I knew: if there was to be an Apocalypse this afternoon, I wasn't going to face it on an empty stomach. 

When I got to the cave I found Aziraphale backed up against the side of it, breathing hard, and the boy floating in the air with his eyes all red, threatening to crush him to bits in a display of his infernal powers. 

"He just lost it," screamed Aziraphale, "and is now coming into his unholy destiny. Have you got a weapon about you, Crowley? I'm supposed to be the nice one here!" 

I squinted my eyes and exerted just enough of my powers to draw the kid's attention to me. That was a mistake. "I'll fix you," says the kid to me. "No one messes with me or my friends, especially not kidnappers. You better beware!"

"Well, that's all well and good," says I, "but have you ever tried smiting on an empty stomach? I wouldn't recommend it."

He agreed that it would be better to wait until after breakfast, and came down out of the air. I thought there was going to be a real row afterwards, but once he finished his food, the red light went out of his eyes, and he and the Hellhound started wandering down the mountain instead of continuing the argument. 

"What's he up to now?" says Aziraphale, anxiously. "You don't think he'll run away, do you, Crowley?"

"No fear of it," says I. "He don't seem to be much of a home body. But we've got to fix up some plan about the end times, since just gettin' him out of the way didn't seem to do much; his powers are getting stronger the closer we get to the End. There don't seem to be much excitement around Lower Tadfield on account of his disappearance, though. His folks may think he's spending the night with his little friends or something. Anyhow, he'll be missed today for sure when the legions of hell are gathering at Megiddo this afternoon."

Just then we heard a kind of war-whoop, and the Antichrist rushed back in. "I've got it!" he says, in a deep, booming voice that brooks no argument. "Today Snake-eye must get a ransom note to my father demanding two thousand pounds for my return. That's how they always do it in the movies. It's not a proper kidnapping without a ransom note." 

He'd barely finished when a trio of scrawny kids burst out into the clearing, yelling and screaming as they rushed at us, demanding that we release Adam or die. It was the Beast's little gang, the Them, and they were in no mood to negotiate our surrender. 

I dodged, and heard a heavy thud and a kind of a sigh from Aziraphale. I turned just in time to see the girl kick him hard in the shins. He crumpled and fell, getting blood and dirt all over his pristine waistcoat, with a big stain that I knew would upset him more than any physical pain these hellions could inflict upon him. 

I told the Antichrist to order his minions to stand down or else I wouldn't be responsible for what happened next--which he did without argument. (How's that for a miracle?) The kids settled down around the fire, sniping about who was going to play what in their little game and roasting more bacon, while I dragged Aziraphale out and miracled away the damage to his clothing where they couldn't see it. 

"Do you know who my favourite Biblical character is now?" Aziraphale mutters under his breath as I worked. 

"Take it easy," says I. "You'll come to your senses presently." 

"King Herod," says he. (You can tell he ain't worked with children much, that one.) "You won't go away and leave me here alone with them, will you, Crowley?"

"You'll be fine," says I. "You're the nice one, remember? Why don't you do some of your magic tricks for them and see how they like it?" 

But I went back out and shook the Antichrist until his curls rattled.

"If you and your friends don't behave," says I, "I'll take you straight home and won't deliver any ransom note to your father. Now, are you going to be a good sport, or not?"

"It's only a game," says he. "I thought it would be more fun if we're all kidnapped together, especially since it's Saturday. I'll behave, Snake-eye, if you won't send me home, and if you'll let us play the Spanish Inquisition."

"I don't know the game," says I, though I could imagine an awful lot, having sat in on more than enough of the original. I'd received a commendation from my superiors for it, despite it not being my idea. "That's for you and my colleague here to decide. He's your companion for the day. I'm going away to deliver the letter to your father, remember? Now, you and your friends better come in and say you are sorry for hurting him, or home you go, at once."

I made them all shake hands with Aziraphale. 

"You know, Crowley," he says to me, "I've stood by you without batting an eye all this time -- in Roman bars, the London Blitz, and the French Revolution. I never lost my nerve yet till we kidnapped that two-legged beast of an Antichrist. He's got me going, and that gang of his is just as dreadful. You won't leave me long with them, will you, Crowley?"

"I'll be back some time this afternoon," says I. "You must keep the boy amused and quiet till I return. And now we'll write the letter to old Young together."

The Antichrist dictated the ransom note I was to deliver to his father--said it was more fun that way. Aziraphale and I got paper and pencil and worked on the letter while the Beast, with a blanket wrapped around him, paced up and down while his friends shouted their own suggestions. Aziraphale begged me tearfully to make the ransom fifteen hundred dollars instead of two thousand that the Antichrist demanded. "I am not attempting," says he, "to decry the celebrated moral aspect of parental affection, but we're dealing with humans, and I don't think it's reasonable to charge them so much in exchange for their only son. Wouldn't fifteen hundred pounds be more reasonable?"

The Antichrist grudgingly admitted that was so. So to relieve Aziraphale, he acceded, and we collaborated a letter that ran this way:

_Dear Mr. Young:_

_We have your boy concealed in a place far from Lower Tadfield. It is useless for you or the most skillful detectives to attempt to find him. Absolutely, the only terms on which you can have him restored to you are these: We demand fifteen hundred pounds in large bills for his return; the money to be left at midnight tonight at the same spot and in the same box as your reply -- as hereinafter described. If you agree to these terms, send your answer in writing by a solitary messenger today at half-past four o'clock. After crossing the creek on the road to Hogback Wood, there are three large trees about a hundred yards apart, close to the hedgerow on the right-hand side on the way to the airbase. At the bottom of the hedge opposite the third tree, will be found a small pasteboard box. The messenger will place the answer in this box and return immediately to Lower Tadfield._

_If you attempt any treachery or fail to comply with our demand as stated, you will never see your boy again._

_If you pay the money as demanded, he will be returned to you safe and well before midnight, assuming the world doesn't end first. These terms are final, and if you do not accede to them no further communication will be attempted._

_TWO DESPERATE KIDNAPPERS._

The Antichrist liked this letter so much, he made me read it to him over and over again; said it sounded just like a story he'd read in a book somewhere. "Only it's _my_ story now," he says. 

"What about the ransom notes to _our_ parents?" demands the girl. "Don't the rest of us get one as well? After all, we've been kidnapped too now." 

"Quiet," says the Beast. "You'll get your turn soon enough." He scratched the hellhound's head. "Snake-eye says we can play the Spanish Inqusition while he's gone." 

"Play it, of course," says I. "Aziraphale here will play with you."

"What kind of a game is it?" asks one of his other friends, the one who was an accountant in miniature. 

"I'm the Head Inquisitor," says the Antichrist, "and I have to go looking for witches and root 'em out as the source of all evil."

"All right," says I. "It sounds harmless to me."

"What am I to do?" asks Aziraphale, looking at the kids suspiciously.

"_You_ are the witch," says the Beast. "Confess that you are a witch after we torture you, of course"

"You'd better keep them interested," said I with a shrug, "till we get the scheme going. Loosen up."

Aziraphale lets them bind his hand, though this look comes in his eye like a rabbit's when you catch it in a trap, even though I knew he could get out of it in a jiffy if he wanted to.

"What happens next?" he asks, in a husky manner of voice.

"We torture you, of course," says the Head Inquisitor. "It's no fun if you just confess it right out! Oh-_lay_!"

"For Heaven's sake," says Aziraphale to me, "hurry back, Crowley, as soon as you can. I wish we hadn't made the ransom more than a thousand. I say, you quit kicking me, young lady or I'll--"

I walked over to Lower Tadfield and had a long chat with the shifty-eyed neighbor who was still out walking his poodle and being a busybody. He says that rumor has it that young Adam is missing--run away, maybe even kidnapped--and he's glad of it because that boy is always up to no good, and at least he couldn't do no mischief in the village that day at least. He also told me about the disgraceful smut on TV and how his garden was doing this year with all the rain of fishes and blood and Tibetans and whatnot. That was more than I wanted to know--things was worse than I feared. I blew tobacco smoke in his face, referred casually to the price of black-eyed peas to divert his attention, stuffed my letter surreptitiously in the Youngs' post box and came away.

When I got back to the cave Aziraphale and the Them were not to be found. I explored the vicinity, and risked a yodel or two, but there was no response. Clouds were gathering on the horizon and there was a lot of lightning in the distance. A storm was brewing and I didn't want to be out in the middle of it, but I didn't have much choice. Pretty soon, there was going to be nothing _but_ storm. 

So I had a cigarette and sat down on a mossy bank to await developments.

In about half an hour I heard the bushes rustle, and a dripping wet Aziraphale stumbled out into the little glade in front of the cave. Behind him was the Them, broad grins on all their faces. Aziraphale stopped and wiped his face with an embroidered handkerchief, which was also sopping wet. The kids stopped about eight feet behind him.

"Crowley," says Aziraphale, "I suppose you'll think I'm a renegade, but I couldn't help it. I'm a grown person with masculine proclivities and habits of self-defense, but there is a time when all systems of egotism and predominance fail. The children are gone. I have sent them home. All is off. There was martyrs in old times," goes on Aziraphale, "that suffered death rather than give up the particular graft they enjoyed. None of 'em ever was subjugated to such supernatural tortures as I have been. I tried to be faithful to our articles of depredation; but there came a limit.

"They put me in the pond," he goes on, "on a makeshift dunking booth, and wouldn't stop, even when I said I was a witch after all. Not even the magic tricks would convince them to stop the torture. And then, for an hour I had to try to explain to all four of them why there was no Tibetans lurking about underground, that there was no such thing as Atlantis, and what to do about alien spaceships visiting the earth. I tell you, Crowley, even an angel such as myself can only stand so much. I told them all I was returning them home post-haste, and they didn't like it much. The girl kicked my legs black-and-blue from the knees down; and I've got to have two or three bites on my thumb and hand cauterized after that dog had a go as well.

"But they're gone" -- continues Aziraphale -- "gone home. I showed them the road back to Tadfield and miracled their bikes back so they'd make it there faster. I'm sorry I spoiled the plan; but I couldn't take it anymore."

Aziraphale is apologizing up a storm, but there is a look of ineffable peace and growing content on his rose-pink features.

"Aziraphale," says I, "How do you feel about surprises?"

"Generally good," says Aziraphale, "I'm all for sudden remissions, deathbed conversions, and lottery ticket winnings. Why?"

"Then you might turn around," says I, "and have a look behind you."

Aziraphale turns and sees the kids with the Antichrist leading the pack, and loses his complexion and sits down plump on the round and begins to pluck aimlessly at grass and little sticks. For an hour I was afraid for his mind. And then I reminded him that my scheme was to put the whole job through immediately and that we would get the ransom and be off with it by midnight if old Young fell in with our proposition and the world didn't end. So Aziraphale braced up enough to give the kid a weak sort of a smile and a promise to rule Russia in when the Beast said he planned on starting over with everything, since the adults had made such a mess of things. 

"And you can have America, Snake-eye," he added, and I thanked him graciously.

Of course the ransom didn't matter to me, but it was importance to keep up appearances for the sake of the kids. The tree under which the answer was to be left -- and the money later on -- was close to the fence of the American air base with big, bare fields on all sides. If the authorities should be watching for any one to come for the note they could see him a long way off crossing the fields or in the road. But no, sirree! At half-past four I was up in that tree as well hidden as--well, a snake in a tree--waiting for the messenger to arrive.

Exactly on time, these four bikers rides up the road on their motorbikes cool as you please--only instead of mucking around in the hedge, they go straight into the air base. This strikes me as odd for bearers of a letter from the agitated parents, so I walk out towards the gate to investigate. Immediately all the kids come rushing out behind me, dragging Aziraphale along in their wake while the dog howls like nobody's business. 

Of course there was an American soldier on guard with a gun, but he didn't pay us no mind, especially after Aziraphale miracled him back home lickety-split. (He was in a bit of a temper now, on account of dealing with children.) By the time the two of us caught up with our charges, the four of them were facing down the avatars of War, Famine, Pollution, and Death, as if it were the Gunfight at the O.K. Corral, which it sorta was, except the fate of the world was at stake. 

But the Four Bikers of the Apocalypse never saw it coming. The girl kicked War in the shins, and the six-toed boy shouted something about sandwiches, and the other boy said he didn't care much for trash, thank you very much, and that was three of them done for. The Beast and Death just stared each other down, and Death blinked first. That was a feat, given that he had no eyelids, being a skeleton and all. Don't ask me to explain that, 'cause I can't. 

Anyway, that was when Gabriel and Beezelbub showed up and caused a ruckus, and then Satan himself came up in even more of a temper than Aziraphale. I thought the jig was up for all of us, but the Hellhound growled disapprovingly, and the Antichrist looked his Infernal father in the eye and said his _real_ father was coming to pay the ransom and would be along presently, and it would spoil the game if the world was to end before that happened. Sure enough, it didn't, though I noticed Gabriel and Beezelbub weren't too happy about this development when they buggered off shortly thereafter. I figured there would be trouble later on their account once all the dust had settled. But first we had to repatriate our charges. 

Not five minutes later, Old Young himself arrived on the scene, contrary to the instructions on the ransom note. Ignoring the rest of us, he began berating Adam for causing so much of a ruckus by pretending to be kidnapped. Turns out the neighbor I talked to had gotten all excited about the Beast's sudden exodus, and said he wouldn't be responsible for what he might to do anyone who went and tried to get him back, and it was cruel, said Mr. Young, to get that poor man's hopes up like that, especially since he was getting on in years and hadn't much else to live for. 

"Great balls of fire!" says I; "of all the impudent -- "

But I glanced at Aziraphale, and hesitated. He had the most appealing look in his eyes I ever saw. 

"Crowley," says he, "what do you say we go and have luncheon at the Ritz like you offered me before all this Armageddon business blew up? You aren't going to let the chance go, are you?" 

"Tell you the truth, Aziraphale," says I, "our career as kidnappers is over, and we'd best make our get-away before Heaven and Hell decide to send their gangs after _us_ instead."

"How long can you hold them off if it comes to a struggle?" asks Aziraphale.

"Well, I don't much like this suggestion," says I, "but I think if we swap appearances we might be able to forestall some trouble that way. Then we could have dinner at the Ritz, after."

"A fine plan," says Aziraphale. "Shall we collect the Bentley and leg it trippingly back to London?" 

And, as dark as it was by then, and as fast as I drove the Bentley, we was halfway to London before they caught up with us.


End file.
